Se­nior of­fi­cial faces charges

Ling Ji­hua has been ex­pelled from the Com­mu­nist Party of China (CPC) and re­moved from public of­fice, ac­cord­ing to a de­ci­sion made at a meet­ing of the Po­lit­i­cal Bureau of the CPC Cen­tral Com­mit­tee..

Ling is the for­mer vice-chair­man of the Chi­nese Peo­ple’s Po­lit­i­cal Con­sul­ta­tive Con­fer­ence (CPPCC) Na­tional Com­mit­tee and a for­mer se­nior aide to re­tired pres­i­dent Hu Jin­tao. He is the latest top of­fi­cial to fall in a graft crack­down.

Ling took ad­van­tage of his posts to seek profit for oth­ers and ac­cepted huge bribes per­son­ally and through his fam­ily, ac­cord­ing to a state­ment re­leased late Mon­day af­ter the meet­ing. The state­ment added that Ling com­mit­ted adul­tery with a num­ber of women and traded his power for sex.

On Dec 22, 2014, the CPC Cen­tral Com­mit­tee de­cided to launch an in­ves­ti­ga­tion into Ling based on clues un­cov­ered by the CCDI.

SHI BUFA / FOR CHINA DAILY

A cou­ple makes their way through an un­der­ground pas­sage flooded by a rain­storm near the rail­way sta­tion in Jin­hua, Zhe­jiang province, on Tues­day. They were in a hurry to catch a train to their home­town in Jiangxi province.